Tricky Doodle Duck
Tricky Doodle Duck is a Remco sound actuated toy released in 1968. Similar Remco toys include Tricky Tommy Turtle and Tricky Peter Penguin. There was even a Tricky Busy School Bus. They would have sold for around $10-$15 each in the late 1960's. Remco made a "Bunny Baby" doll that responded to a whistle as well.
Patents:
Tricky Doodle Duck: US3538639
Tricky Tommy Turtle: US3462880
Sound Controlled Toys: US3458950A
Patents:
Tricky Doodle Duck: US3538639
Tricky Tommy Turtle: US3462880
Sound Controlled Toys: US3458950A
Tricky Doodle Duck
The important things we were looking for in a Tricky Doodle Duck acquisition were: a battery compartment cover, unbroken tie, cap in place, complete eye decals, feathers intact, and the whistle. A box and instructions would be bonuses. We purchased Tricky (sans whistle and instructions) in "unknown condition", which usually translates to "not working" in the case of battery operated toys. We really hoped that cleaning the electrical contacts on the battery cover and inside the battery compartment would be sufficient to get Tricky running. This was not the case. Burnishing the contacts produced no effect whatsoever when batteries were installed. The next most likely problem would be a seized up motor or broken internal wiring. Bypassing the circuitry and jump starting the motor through its contacts would involve opening the body. This would appear to be an easy proposition since Tricky has several screws located around the periphery of his body. As you can see from the rest of this entry, this task proved to be a huge challenge which is likely the main reason that collectors rarely find complete and functional Tricky Doodles.
There is a snap in cover on the bottom of the duck that one would assume provides access to the motor. We were were afraid to flex this hatch to pop it out because it was stiff with age. We loosened several nearby body screws to give us enough maneuverability to pop the hatch. Instead of providing access to the motor, the hatch actually protects the gear train (or keeps little fingers from getting pinched in the drive train). We were disappointed to see that the motor leads were deeply recessed and not accessible. We also found that the gear train was plagued with hardened grease as well as wound up with lint and hair (the late 1960s and early 70s featured shag carpets and shaggy hair). We used needle nose pliers, razor blades, and plastic picks to cut and pull the hair out. We used compressed air to blow out any remaining dust and lint. We were able to get the tip of the clock oiler to the motor spindle and the gear pivots but still not able to attach electrical leads to power the motor directly to test it.
Opening the rest of the duck became essential to diagnosing the motor. However, the tie and cap would have to be removed first. We were worried that the stud holding the neck strap of the tie in place would break off during the unfastening process because the tie was hardened with age. We successfully removed the tie only to discover that the cap was pegged to the head of the duck. Looking at the patent led us to believe that the peg holding the cap in place was just press fitted. We applied a little gentle heat from a hair dryer to make the cap plastic slightly more pliable and less likely to crack. Trying to extract the peg with gentle prying and rocking caused the button to crack off. This allowed the cap to be removed but revealed that the peg was actually cemented in place and would not have come out without invasive surgery. Using a razor saw, I carefully cut down through the peg to align with the seam in the duck hoping to free the two halves and reveal the inner workings. This almost worked but for the fact that the duck is also joined together internally by posts projecting from either eye. The duck was now mostly open and its inner workings revealed. The microphone and transistor circuit board looked fine. The rocker arm and bellows for moving the bill and generating the "quacking" sound looked whole but seized up. The bellows is a possible concern because it looks to be a coated fabric that might have become brittle with age. Applying power to the motor leads caused the motor to spasm and stall. The drive train gears were still seized up. I manually turned the gear train through several revolutions and removed additional hair, lint, and hardened grease. Now the motor turned when powered up directly as well as from the battery compartment itself. I had to stop working on Tricky Doodle before getting the clacking bill and quacking mechanism operational. I don't think I am out of the woods yet and fear that I may have to completely separate the two halves of the duck body to get him fully operational.
There is a snap in cover on the bottom of the duck that one would assume provides access to the motor. We were were afraid to flex this hatch to pop it out because it was stiff with age. We loosened several nearby body screws to give us enough maneuverability to pop the hatch. Instead of providing access to the motor, the hatch actually protects the gear train (or keeps little fingers from getting pinched in the drive train). We were disappointed to see that the motor leads were deeply recessed and not accessible. We also found that the gear train was plagued with hardened grease as well as wound up with lint and hair (the late 1960s and early 70s featured shag carpets and shaggy hair). We used needle nose pliers, razor blades, and plastic picks to cut and pull the hair out. We used compressed air to blow out any remaining dust and lint. We were able to get the tip of the clock oiler to the motor spindle and the gear pivots but still not able to attach electrical leads to power the motor directly to test it.
Opening the rest of the duck became essential to diagnosing the motor. However, the tie and cap would have to be removed first. We were worried that the stud holding the neck strap of the tie in place would break off during the unfastening process because the tie was hardened with age. We successfully removed the tie only to discover that the cap was pegged to the head of the duck. Looking at the patent led us to believe that the peg holding the cap in place was just press fitted. We applied a little gentle heat from a hair dryer to make the cap plastic slightly more pliable and less likely to crack. Trying to extract the peg with gentle prying and rocking caused the button to crack off. This allowed the cap to be removed but revealed that the peg was actually cemented in place and would not have come out without invasive surgery. Using a razor saw, I carefully cut down through the peg to align with the seam in the duck hoping to free the two halves and reveal the inner workings. This almost worked but for the fact that the duck is also joined together internally by posts projecting from either eye. The duck was now mostly open and its inner workings revealed. The microphone and transistor circuit board looked fine. The rocker arm and bellows for moving the bill and generating the "quacking" sound looked whole but seized up. The bellows is a possible concern because it looks to be a coated fabric that might have become brittle with age. Applying power to the motor leads caused the motor to spasm and stall. The drive train gears were still seized up. I manually turned the gear train through several revolutions and removed additional hair, lint, and hardened grease. Now the motor turned when powered up directly as well as from the battery compartment itself. I had to stop working on Tricky Doodle before getting the clacking bill and quacking mechanism operational. I don't think I am out of the woods yet and fear that I may have to completely separate the two halves of the duck body to get him fully operational.
Tricky Doodle As Purchased
Repair - Round 1
Repair - Round 2
Round 1 left us with a still non-functional duck - which we found unsatisfactory. Round 2 involved getting even more aggressive and completely separating the duck body to fully access all his mechanisms and electronics. We believed that the two halves were held together by a press fit post and sleeve arrangement between the duck's right and left eyes. Our second guess was that the interlocking pieces were glued together like the cap stalk. Working on the press fit assumption (the least damaging operation to the duck if true) we directed heat from a hair dryer down a funnel inserted in the duck's mouth to the join expecting the heat to differentially expand the outer sleeve and release the join. No luck. Moving on to the glue assumption, we decided to slip a coping saw blade through the mouth opening and making a clean cut severing the post and sleeve join that could eventually be re-glued together. That worked for a few millimeters and then the saw blade would no longer cut. It became apparent that the two-halves were actually screwed together and that the screw was hidden underneath an eye decal. Rather than destroy the eye decal to get to the screw, we decided to switch to an unmounted hacksaw blade and cut through the screw. We felt it would not sacrifice the integrity of the head join when the duck was reassembled because the cap mounting arrangement also holds the head together. Once the cut was done, we had full access to the inside of the duck.
As I worked on the duck, it became very obvious to me why so many Tricky Doodles are missing their battery covers. The cover is not attached to the duck, and it can only stay in place when a battery is present. This created an interesting dilemma to users: either leave the battery out when the duck was not being used thereby preventing corrosion but running the risk of losing the cover OR leaving the battery in and risk damaging the innards of the duck but preventing the loss of the battery cover. Finding a used Tricky Doodle with both clean contacts AND a battery cover must be something of a miracle.
As I worked on the duck, it became very obvious to me why so many Tricky Doodles are missing their battery covers. The cover is not attached to the duck, and it can only stay in place when a battery is present. This created an interesting dilemma to users: either leave the battery out when the duck was not being used thereby preventing corrosion but running the risk of losing the cover OR leaving the battery in and risk damaging the innards of the duck but preventing the loss of the battery cover. Finding a used Tricky Doodle with both clean contacts AND a battery cover must be something of a miracle.
Whistle
Tricky was purchased from eBay and was missing his whistle (a very common situation for the Remco sound activated toys). We were able to locate an original whistle by searching for duck whistles on eBay. The person selling the whistle had no idea that the whistle had been connected with Tricky Doodle Duck toys. The whistle was desirable because it completed the set as well as created a sound of the correct frequency to trigger the circuitry inside the duck. Without the whistle, we would have had to experiment with other sound producing gadgets to find something that generated a usable tone.